In Town

For years she was everybody's favorite face on NBC's Today Show and Dateline, a reassuringly healthy, down-to-earth Midwesterner interviewing newsmakers and ordinary people alike. We all thought we knew her, so it's a surprise to read Jane Pauley's recent book, Skywriting, and discover that she's struggled with bipolar disorder-something that makes her a natural to speak in support of Lee Mental Health's campaign to open a mental health emergency room for those experiencing a crisis. For tickets to An Evening with Jane Pauley, Nov. 10 at Bishop Verot's Anderson Theater, call (239) 791-1521.

Q. You just got your last child off to college. Empty-nest syndrome hitting hard?

A. It was such a huge shock three years ago when I got the twins, who are seniors now, off to school, but at least we still had our son, Tommy, at home. Now that he's gone, I realize how much space he took! So we're moving-downsizing. I'm making the best use of my idle time by packing, and it's so satisfying editing everything down.

Q. You have idle time because you recently left NBC after all these years-what's next?

A. I'm enjoying the break after 33 years. I loved being at home this summer, and now that it's fall-the time to start new things-I don't really know what's next. I've always been such a planner for the future, and for once I'm not doing that. I figure if nothing interests me, I still have a career behind me.

Q. What's been the response to your book and your disclosure about your illness?

A. Lovely, frankly. Only about 10 percent of the book was really about mental illness, but for the people I run into almost every day, that's what they talk about. Some of them have struggled for years, or maybe someone in their family has just been diagnosed. And I think they read from this book that there is a possibility of a life lived in the context of mental illness. You can have a family; you can have a career. People see me as someone who made it OK.

Q. What did you think of Tom Cruise's recent comments about psychiatry?

A. It seriously troubles me, because so many people pay attention to him. He doesn't have the credentials to make those judgments, and I don't know what his agenda is.

Q. Is another book in the wings?

A. I love to write, and nothing would make me happier than writing another book, but so far nothing has emerged. I have to have something to say first. But sometimes the creative process works that way; you have to have a significant fallow time. I'm hoping that is what this is now.

-Kay Kipling